Arizona Hunting Club & Outdoor Adventure Group

Deer and Elk Feeding Area Photographs

Deer and Elk can feed on a wide variety of plants, bushes and trees because they are ruminants. When looking for signs of feeding or grazing, look for areas that literally look like someone took a lawn mower and mowed big areas in pastures, areas near the edges of forests and especially around damp areas where green grass grows very well.

The easiest way to show you what to look for is to show you pictures of what we are talking about. Please review the pictures below for signs of good feeding areas for deer and elk.

This photograph shows a close up of one clump of green grass that has been grazed almost to the ground.

This photograph show a bunch of green grass that has been grazed very low. Another key item to note in all of these pictures is the amount of green in the grass. Many people see lots of grass that is brown and wonder why no elk or deer are feeding here. Green grass has lots of nutrients. Brown grass has almost none. No chlorophyl equals no nutrients.

Elk and deer love to eat the new growth from pine trees, oak trees, cedar bushes and many other bush type plants. If you see, bushes that have all of the new growth eaten off, you are in a good feeding area, especially if you are near water.

The next three photos may look the same, but they represent 3 different stock tanks. With that said, they all look the same because the elk and deer have been grazing on the green grass that grows well in stock tanks as the water slowly recedes.

This picture doesn't show it well, but the green in this picture is actually sweet clover; a favorite of both deer and elk.

This picture once again shows more than 3,000 tracks of elk that have come here to eat the green grass growing along the shoreline.

This pictures shows what a typical staging area looks like. This tree is like a water cooler. The elk have gathered here for the green grass and for the view of a stock tank that is 1/4 of a mile down the hill. From this vantage spot they can watch for predator movements around their favorite watering hole before it gets dark.

In the fall, the golden leaves can show you where acorns are lying on the ground. Oak trees at the top of hills shed their acorns first, and all the trees drop their acorns in order going down the hill. If you want to put out some bait, gather several hundred acorns and put them out for the deer and elk to eat underneath your stand. Better yet, put up a tree stand over natural acorn drop areas.

The next two pictures are areas that are full of berry bushes. Not sure what kind they were, but there were elk and deer tracks every where.

A close up of the grass that has been grazed by deer and elk on the berm of a stock tank.

This grassy meadow is deep in the forest. It is protected on all sides by trees. The deer and elk like these areas because the can't be seen from any roads and the likelihood of a person finding them is rare.

This is a close-up shot of elk tracks next to the very green grass growing along the water line. Green grass is a coveted resource by all big game animals.